I'd like to address an issue that has been bothering me a lot lately.
In a nutshell, the American pharmaceutical industry of today has little interest in developing cheap and effective treatments, even if they address common or potentially disastrous problems. The latest poster child of this phenomenon is the flu. Specifically, America's inability to produce flu vaccine, there being only one manufacturer in this country. With the specter of bird flu lurking in the wings, it has become a matter of national security. Yet when anyone points this out, I hear a lot of muttering about no profit being in it, so what can you do. Nor are vaccines the only type of treatment that is being neglected.
I don't know about you, but when the free market fails in life-or-death matters, I start looking for other solutions.
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